ACP policy update 2025: How Medicaid cuts threaten community-based primary care

In an interview with Medical Economics at the American College of Physicians (ACP) Internal Medicine Meeting 2025, Brian Outland, PhD, director of regulatory affairs at the ACP, outlines the ripple effects Medicaid cuts could have on access to care — particularly in community-based primary care settings.

“It’s not having those payments … or those patients not having their insurance [that] will then affect them being able to see their physician,” Outland said. “Patients will perhaps start going to the ER, using that more, not having access to their physician, which cares about them.”

He emphasized the moral and operational strain this places on physicians. “To see them without reimbursement is a hard thing to ask the physicians to do, but they will do their best in making sure that they take care of their patients,” he said.

Outland stressed that the ACP continues to push back on proposed cuts. “We continue at ACP to advocate that those patients who are the most vulnerable patients in the United States continue to get their income from those patients and be able to see those patients and treat them with the care that they deserve.”